LONDON: Even in the chaos and violence of war there is hope. That is the message running through a new British Museum exhibition of Afghanistan's ancient treasures thought lost, destroyed, or looted over the past 30 years. The collection of 200 priceless artefacts spanning 4,000 years of history, from enamelled Roman glass goblets, stunning solid gold headdresses and polished stone tableware from Egypt, were saved by a handful of Afghan officials who risked their lives hiding them. Afghan President Hamid Karzai, in London for talks with British Prime Minister David Cameron, opened the exhibition “Afghanistan: Crossroads of the Ancient World”, late Tuesday. In ancient times, the country was the crossroads linking Asia to the Middle East and Europe. Sitting strategically along the heavily trodden trade routes, now known as the Silk Road, it was here that goods were exchanged – including lacquer from China, ivory from India and luxuries from Roman Egypt. Included for the first time is a set of stolen first century Indian ivory furniture carvings bought on the antiquities market by a London dealer only last year. They have rarely been seen in public. The show begins with a 2nd-century BC limestone statue of a youth with long flowing hair and Macedonian sombrero-like hat on his back. It comes from a Hellenistic Greek city – later known as Ai Khanum in Uzbek – founded in Bactria on the Oxus river, northern Afghanistan, by one of Alexander the Great's generals Seleucus I.
